


you've already blossomed

by brightlight



Category: SEVENTEEN (Band)
Genre: Arranged Marriage AU, M/M, Royalty AU, gay princes who are gay and in love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-19
Updated: 2019-02-19
Packaged: 2019-10-31 17:59:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,602
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17854460
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brightlight/pseuds/brightlight
Summary: Minghao had no confusion about his marriage. He knew things with Hansol were never going to be sonnets, courting, aching at night just to see his face. It was advantageous. It was a political gesture.Still. It was nice that he was sweet, wasn’t it?





	you've already blossomed

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kneedeepsnow](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kneedeepsnow/gifts).



> hello! this is a commission for the lovely kneedeepsnow on ao3 & twitter who so graciously asked me to pick back up this old fic idea i had a few months ago and run with it.
> 
> for reference, this fic is set in Generic Fantasy World with vaguely european royalty aesthetics, but with no geographical references/stand-ins for actual countries or languages. (sometimes i get kinda thrown off when it’s clear something is an Allegory To China or Korea and get confused trying to make sense of it so i just wanted to clarify!!) also, this is my gay fantasy world, so let’s not quibble about the logic of heirs/inheritance in this bad boy.
> 
> title from "flower" by seventeen

No part of this arrangement has come as a surprise to Minghao. He has known for a very long time that the poetry his tutors read to him, words about true love and courtship, were never going to be in his future. When he was young and his mother brought him on diplomatic journeys, she would point out the young nobility, tell him, “Look for one that’s marriageable.” 

And Minghao did look. He appreciated that even in the world he lived in, where choices are so rarely his own, his mother wanted to allow him some dignity in the matter. 

“I can’t make you any promises,” she would say to Minghao when he was older, during the dinners they didn’t spend in the grand dining hall, at a table far too large for only the two of them. “You understand why at some point, your options may narrow.”

It’s one thing to be the first-born to the queen. It’s another to be the _only_ child to a queen who has spent most of Minghao’s life widowed. There is no one else. He has cousins, but no matter how kind his mother is, politics are politics, and the throne is to stay in her direct lineage. It was never in question, him becoming king. It was only a matter of when, and how. 

“And a proper king needs a suitor,” his mother’s chancellors would say. “Otherwise, you know how they talk.”

Minghao, small and curious, wondered then what they said about his mother. His mother’s frown told him enough. A lonely ruler leads to rumors — this is another thing he learned as he grew. Rumors of instability, of distrust. No, it’s a far better scene to be painted when the ruler has happy family portraits, when your people can speak amiably about the love in the king’s eyes when he looks at his betrothed. A man can be as cruel as he is able in the privacy of his own quarters as long as his people see him with love in his eyes; Minghao has learned this well from the circles he travels in.

There’s never been a question that his marriage would be for political diplomacy, but still, the day his mother’s chancellor knocks on his study door, speaking of news, speaking of a counsel with the queen, Minghao is taken aback. It’s sooner than he thought it would be, for one. He’s only twenty-three years old, and he always thought this call would come later. When he was older, when his ascent to the crown was more conceivable. 

Secondly, he thought he would have some warning. A hint. His mother letting him know that diplomatic arrangements were being made. But this is sudden. He furrows his eyebrows, concerned, as he follows behind the chancellor to the queen’s court.

His mother sits on the throne, her gaze harsh (which is normal), but there’s an apologetic tilt to the set of her jaw when Minghao walks in. “Prince Minghao,” she greets. He nods, bowing deeply. But his eyes are drawn to the two other figures in the room, and he looks them over in a way that’s well-practiced; quick and observant, the way he’s been trained to be. It’s a man and his son, resemblance clear between them even though the younger man is taller, even though their facial features are different. There’s something in the way they hold themselves that lets Minghao know. They’re both in fine clothing, looking some amount of nervous. Minghao is studying the young man in front of him, looking over the deep blue velvet of his coat, noticing (observing, objectively) the handsome slope of his nose, the cut of his jaw, when he realizes the other man is looking back. His eyes are curious, and the corner of his lips lifts in something like a smile. 

Minghao looks away, flustered even though he has no right to be. He’s royalty, after all — he’s allowed to look at whomever he likes. Still, Minghao thinks, readjusting his coat. Still.

“Marriage arrangements have been made for you, Prince Minghao,” his mother says, always straight to the point. Her voice is impassive. Minghao wonders how she will sound in her chambers later, when they speak more frankly. 

“I see,” he replies.

“Prince Chwe Hansol,” his mother says, gesturing to the man across from him. The man turns fully to Minghao, bows deep.

“Hello,” he says, language sounding unsure on his tongue, cheeks going pink when Minghao raises an eyebrow. 

“Hello,” Minghao replies, giving his own bow in return. 

“We appreciate your generosity, your majesty,” Hansol’s father says, and that’s strange. Everything about this is strange. It’s strange that he’s to marry a family that he’s never heard of, and it’s strange that his mother would treat a stranger with apparent generosity. She’s not an unkind woman, but she’s business-minded, logical. She’s rarely swayed by her heart — she doesn’t have the luxury.

The father sounds more familiar with their language, speaks almost fluently. Minghao wonders, then, why the prince doesn’t seem able. 

His mother nods, brusque, and says, “We have further arrangements to discuss. Minghao, you can fetch my chancellor to show Hansol the grounds, if you would like.”

It’s a carefully-played out. It’s his mother saying _if you would like to be alone, leave now._ But the prince in front of him, his… _fiance_ , he supposes — Hansol, his name is Hansol — he looks nervous. Uncomfortable. 

Minghao can’t help but to say, “No. I can show him.”

His mother regards him for a moment, nods in a way that Minghao knows is familiar, the closest she can get to warm in front of others, and says, “Fine.”

 

It becomes clear mere feet from the large, ornate doors of the queen’s court that Hansol’s full breadth of knowledge of Minghao’s language is “hello” and “thank you.”

“Thank you,” he says, when Minghao leads him down the hallway, and then again when Minghao gestures to the portraits hung on the wall.

“What language do you speak?” Minghao asks. He knows a few, mostly knows them at least, and maybe he could get by in those. But Hansol just looks at him blankly, a nervous expression still on his face like he doesn’t know how to answer.

Minghao, at a bit of a loss, points to his mouth. Makes his best attempt at a talking gesture with his hand. Looks questioningly at Hansol. 

“Oh,” he hears Hansol say, and then Hansol says the name of a language Minghao has heard of, but never studied.

“Ah,” Minghao replies. He nods. He thinks it will be an interesting engagement.

♛♛

The translator is a help. Minghao requests one that first afternoon, after he and Hansol walk through the grounds exchanging various hellos and thank yous. Still, despite their difficulties, it wasn’t a bad way to spend an afternoon; though he doesn’t acknowledge it often, Minghao has always enjoyed the company of beautiful young men.

And Hansol is that — beautiful, he means. Beautiful in a way that he was taught not to expect. In a storybook kind of way, an enchanting kind of way. All sharp features and kind eyes and warm brown hair falling softly into his face. Broad shoulders, Minghao noticed early. Tall. If he were at any of Minghao’s previous diplomatic engagements, he thinks he would have noticed him easily. Kept a little mental tab on him, in the small part of his mind he allows to be hopeful.

But he had never met Hansol before that day. His mother explained why, late that night in her chambers, after answering her door like she was waiting for him to come.

“I used to know his father, years ago. He was in line for a throne west of here, but he absconded in search of a woman. Who, I suppose, he found,” she says mildly. “He was always a kind man, his father. We were friends, I suppose.”

Friends. Minghao had heard little of his mother having friends, but he supposes that before she was a queen, she was a princess. A person somewhat like Minghao himself. A person with something like a personal life. “But now he’s back.”

She nods. “Now he’s back. His wife is in a difficult situation with her family, and he’s returned to make a life for them here. He needed political support to back him before he returned to his rightful kingdom.”

“And I’m that support,” Minghao guesses. “We’re that support.”

She nods, looks down. “I apologize, for not giving warning. It was sudden. I believe it’s beneficial for everyone involved. And...his father was always a good man. I believe his son would make a good husband.”

Minghao nods. He’s not upset, not really; his mother did a kind thing. Minghao had to get married for someone, he figures he might as well be helping someone by doing it. 

And anyway, for as little as he knows about him, Hansol seems likeable. Admittedly, everything has been filtered through Jisoo, through two layers of translation, but he thinks the sentiment is the same. Hansol isn’t staying in the castle but he comes to visit in the afternoons, on a schedule so regular that by Friday, he’s waiting in the gardens for Hansol to arrive.

Hansol likes art, he learns; his mother is an artist, his father paints too. He’s close with his mother, and is anxious for her to follow them here. He’s allergic to flowers, but he likes walking through the gardens anyway, because he likes the way they look. 

“He seems sweet,” he tells Junhui quietly one morning. Junhui’s had free time lately, and he’s chosen to spend it lounged dramatically in Minghao’s chambers, complaining that he missed him. Junhui’s the one who’s been away, spending more of his time west these days; he was married nearly two years ago now, but he and Wonwoo had been operating somewhat independently, both living with their families until recently.

Junhui regards him skeptically, looking amused. “Sweet?” 

Minghao shrugs defensively. 

“I didn’t know you liked sweet, Minghao,” Junhui says.

“Of course I like sweet,” Minghao says with a frown. “Just because I never snuck around having torrid little affairs doesn’t mean you get to tease me about my love life.”

Junhui’s smiling. “You’re so discreet, Minghao, that’s what I’ve always liked about you.”

“Well, you’re not having them anymore, so what’s the harm in me talking about them?” Minghao asks.

Junhui has been in Minghao’s world for so long, sometimes he forgets they’re not family. Junhui has always had the energy of an annoying older brother, teasing Minghao gently, but he manages to be so endearing all the while that Minghao has never had the heart to dislike him. Their families know each other somehow, got tangled up together sometime in history, Minghao’s not really sure of the details anymore — it’s hard to keep up with these things when powerful families make and break ties every month — but it means that through their adolescence, they were frequent visitors to each other’s homes. Minghao would be tucked into an extravagant guest bed and find himself woken up by Junhui, skin still cold from the moonlight and only barely back in sleep clothing, pushing into Minghao’s bed with too much familiarity and an excited chattering whisper. _He kissed me, he kissed me, right by the stables,_ Junhui would say, and Minghao would wake up with a mixed feeling of awe and fear at the way Junhui skirted his father’s rules so brazenly. 

His own marriage was a year’s worth of sulking and petulance from Junhui, a long-awaited arrangement that Junhui never hesitated to voice his displeasure with. Still, after he was married to Wonwoo, Junhui’s little trysts stopped. The resentment in Junhui’s voice was replaced with aggravated sort of acceptance, and then, after not very long at all, resigned fondness. 

“You’ve never struck me as the kind of person who liked...well, romance,” Junhui says, looking him over.

Minghao furrows his eyebrows. “I’ve never had a use for it before.”

He’s avoiding the question. He doesn’t tell a lot of people — well, any people, really, besides the tutor who brings him the books he requests — but the truth is, he is the kind of person who likes romance. It was a little sad, to think it would never be something he would get to hold in his hands, that pleasant companionship was the best he could hope for, but he read about love like an enthusiastic child leaning over the side of an animal pen, reaching out to touch. 

He had no confusion about his marriage. He knew this thing with Hansol was never going to be sonnets, courting, aching at night just to see their face. It was advantageous. It was a political gesture.

Still. It was nice that he was sweet, wasn’t it?

♛♛

“I have been thinking,” Minghao says to Hansol, waits for Jisoo to translate before he continues, “I would like to learn your language.”

Jisoo repeats him, then looks at him with interest. Minghao, unfortunately, is more drawn to the pleased smile on Hansol’s face. It’s an awfully nice smile, Minghao thinks. 

Hansol speaks, words staccato with hard sounds, and Jisoo relays, “He wants to learn yours as well.” 

“Then perhaps we should work together?” Minghao suggests, feeling strangely vulnerable as he says it. 

After that, forgo the gardens and meet in Minghao’s favorite library in the castle instead, and Jisoo comes less and less. Though Jisoo does look entertained when he drops in, looking between them with an expression of amusement and fondness. 

They start simply. Showing each other alphabets, how the letters fit together to write their own names. Small words, the foundation words they need to make half-broken sentences. They write on the paper in front of them and repeat to each other, fixing pronunciation. Their wedding has been scheduled for three months away, and they spend most afternoons in those months learning. Teaching.

Hansol brings books, sits them out in front of where they huddle together at a table and reads them out loud in a steady voice; Minghao works to pick out the words he knows, to copy sentences from them and practice making the characters. On days when Jisoo comes, he checks the meaning, then writes it below the sentence in his native tongue, teaches Hansol back. It’s slow, and patient, and Minghao finds he enjoys the excited smile Hansol has whenever Minghao does something well. He enjoys the closeness of their hands on the paper in front of them, and over the months, he enjoys understanding more of what Hansol says. 

They write each other notes in the language they’re learning, unsteady strokes of pen on paper, read them out loud when they’ve finished. They laugh sheepishly when the other takes a pen and crosses out, corrects, and share matching grins when they can speak to each other plainly, even if it’s only for a moment. 

In the wake of his engagement, of his marriage, Minghao has had fewer duties to attend to; his diplomatic responsibilities have been sparser, and his mother’s chancellors have given him some space. It’s a small gesture, but it means that most of his time is spent in the library, with Hansol or by himself, trying to learn. He thinks he’s doing alright, making decent progress, and it seems that Hansol is too.

“Hello,” Minghao says one afternoon to greet Hansol.

“Hello,” Hansol replies easily in Minghao’s language. “It’s good to see you.”

Minghao smiles. “Thank you. It’s good to see you too.”

“I’ve been looking forward to you,” Hansol says. It’s not perfect, but it’s good. He can’t keep the smile on his face from widening.

“I’ve been looking forward to seeing you, too,” Minghao tells him, and finds that he means it. Hansol was with his father for most of the week, unable to visit for very long.

“Next week,” Hansol starts, pausing and thinking. “We are together then.”

Minghao nods. Their wedding is only nine days away. “Are you nervous?”

Hansol furrows his eyebrows. “Write that.”

Minghao scribes the word on the paper he brought, writing it carefully. He tries to think if he knows the word in Hansol’s language, opens a bound notebook that he’s been trying to keep organized enough to use as a guide. One of these meetings, Hansol used the word happy, and they traded words for feelings for a couple hours afterward. He finds the page he used, and writes the word in Hansol’s language below his own.

“Ah,” Hansol says. Repeats the word. “I thought yes before, but now no.”

Minghao tries not to feel too warm, too fond over the careful way Hansol speaks. To return the favor, Minghao switches to Hansol’s native language. “I feel that way too,” he says.

Hansol gives him a small smile. “Oh, good.”

It’s this shy delicate thing, the way they’ve gotten into the habit of smiling at each other. Vulnerable in a way that is wholly unfamiliar to Minghao, unlike any interaction he’s had with anyone else. Hansol is like that, though — different. He’s unreserved, expressed every feeling clear on his face, and doesn’t seem shy about it. It’s so different from the way Minghao was raised, to keep his face still and stay unreadable. 

They write each other notes as they sit together in the library, short things, but they’ve taken to writing letters, as well. Longer, pages long, and Minghao tries to pick out the words he knows and string them together as best he can before he takes them to Jisoo to get them translated. Minghao remembers one that Hansol gave him, when he looks at Hansol’s pleased face. “My father never wanted the throne. He hated growing up so rigidly. He never wanted me to have the same life, but right now, it is a necessity.”

In Minghao’s reply, he asked, “Did you expect to marry for love? Are you disappointed?” It was one sentence in three pages of writing, about upbringing and family and all the ways that Minghao finds himself standing as a careful outsider to life, the ways he is jealous of Hansol’s upbringing, removed from all this. But it was the one question among all of them that he really wanted answered. 

Hansol’s next letter came days later, as they often did, and it took two days more to get a translated copy from Jisoo. But buried deep on one of the pages, Hansol wrote, “You asked if I am disappointed. I find it hard to manage, since I enjoy your company so.”

Minghao tried to ignore the little thrill he got from it, running a finger over Jisoo’s writing. Tried to put it from his mind, because surely, there was something more important for him to focus on. But he thinks of it now, when he sees that smile on Hansol’s face. 

Minghao isn’t nervous either, as it turns out.

♛♛

The wedding is large, but feels larger still from the presence of an audience that isn’t in attendance. The audience of the public, who won’t be viewing them in the large hall, seats filled with people deemed important, but whose opinion has weight. Whose eyes are on them regardless.

Though, truthfully, Minghao is finding it hard to focus on that, really. Hansol and Minghao are standing side by side in front of a large mirror, tailors flurrying around them to fix the crease in Hansol’s collar. One of his chancellors is standing nearby, trying to tell Minghao about a letter of congratulations from an aunt he barely remembers, and Jisoo is in the back of the room talking quietly with Minghao’s favorite clothier, Jeonghan. He didn’t know they were acquainted, but they look familiar with each other.

“Don’t they look pretty?” Jeonghan asks with an ever-present smirk on his face. Jisoo rolls his eyes, shakes his head with an amused smile. Minghao just glares back at him through the mirror. 

“Oh, Minghao, don’t look at me like that. Without me, how would your blushing groom look so handsome?” Jeonghan asks. 

Minghao furrows his eyebrows at him, asking him to stop without really asking, because Hansol is blushing a little, and he may allow Jeonghan to tease him, but Hansol is new. 

“For once in your life, have some decorum before I fire you,” Minghao says.

“He’ll do it,” Jisoo comments mildly. 

“I know he’ll do it. That’s why I like him,” Jeonghan says, still smiling, but he steps forward with a bow toward both of them. “I apologize, your highness, for my forwardness.”

“Maybe his highness should spend more time teaching you to watch your mouth,” Jisoo says. He’s joking, but there’s a tone of satisfaction in his voice. Minghao imagines that everyone who knows Jeonghan appreciates seeing him grovel every once in a while.

“Are you sure you wouldn’t like to instead? Watch my mouth, I mean,” Jeonghan replies with a delighted little smirk as Jisoo goes pink.

“Jeonghan,” Minghao says. 

Jeonghan raises his hands in innocence, shaking back the long dark hair that swoops romantically across his face. “My apologies, my apologies. I’ll keep my personal matters to myself.” Jisoo, for his part, still looks flustered.

The trouble is, Jeonghan’s right; Hansol does look handsome. His jacket is a cream color, the sheen on the fine fabric catching the light and sparkling a little, suiting his complexion, suiting his noble face. Minghao has felt a little taken aback all morning, standing next to him. He remembers thinking when they met that Hansol was beautiful in a storybook kind of way, and this — was almost too much for him, really. Minghao’s own clothes are fine, sure, but he’s having trouble looking away from Hansol’s reflection. Hansol catches his eyes in the mirror and Minghao smiles.

“Still not nervous?” Minghao asks in Hansol’s language, because at least then the only person who can follow along is Jisoo. Hansol shakes his head. Smiles simply, like this is a normal day, like any day they’ve ever had has been normal. “No. Not nervous.”

“Me either,” Minghao tells him. And it’s true. Not for the wedding, at least, which he knows will be a boring few hours of his life. 

And really, he’s only just barely nervous for the rest of it; for the simple fact that Hansol arrived to the castle this morning with two trunks and the question, “Where are my sleeping quarters?” Minghao showed Hansol to his room, nearly as large and ornate as Minghao’s own, and only regretted for a moment that they were not sharing one. He’s been having dreams lately, of mornings in bed with Hansol. Just that — just them waking up next to one another, at the soft warmth of them lying under the covers. Of Hansol kissing his cheek, of waking up slow for once in his life. 

But none of that was important. None of that made him nervous, not in any way that mattered. It didn’t matter, that little spark he felt when their fingers brushed on a page in a book, or when Hansol smiled at him like he had no reason to hold it back. What mattered, today, was the two of them standing in front of a room of important people and accepting a legal arrangement. 

The ceremony itself is as boring as Minghao expected it to be. An officiant saying a lot of words that don’t matter. A lot of dignified nodding. Junhui and Wonwoo are in attendance, and Minghao keeps seeing Junhui try to catch his eye and make him smile, but Minghao stays focused on his poise. He’s always been good at being poised. 

It’s boring, and long, and then suddenly, it’s over. There’s applause, there’s bowing, and there are two matching crowns being placed on their heads as they kneel in deference. Minghao looks up from where he was holding his gaze steady on the floor and meets Hansol’s eyes, mostly by accident. Hansol smiles at him, tentative, small, and Minghao doesn’t choose to return it as much as his body does it on instinct. He looks Hansol over, the way the crown fits neatly over the soft waves his hair falls in, the sparkle in his eyes, and Minghao smiles wider. 

“You look like a true prince,” Minghao says quietly, just for Hansol to hear.

“You too,” Hansol says back.

♛♛

In a storybook, Minghao thinks this would be the part where things change. Where suddenly the characters are overcome with love and live happily ever after in the castle, or maybe, in a different kind of story, the part where they realize their lives are unfulfilled, and they run away together, start a new life as unknown peasants with full hearts.

But in Minghao’s life, things continue almost the same as they had before. Just busier. He has meetings, lots of meetings, about the union of their families. He has his regular council meetings, sitting at his mother’s side as advisors argue in their own best interest. He has his regular responsibilities — visits from his tutors, and occasionally from other diplomats. With the engagement over, his free time seems to have disappeared, and he feels badly about that, because he worries for what Hansol does by himself during the day. 

They eat dinner together on most nights, though, and the two of them try to talk as much as they can. Which, over the span of two more months, ends up being a surprising amount.

“I have been learning, still,” Hansol says once. “During the day. Jisoo is helping.”

Minghao smiles, pleased. “Me too,” he says. He’s had his tutors bring him books, and asked for an instructor. He thinks he’s improving.

“Say something, then,” Hansol says. 

Minghao thinks. “I worry that you have not been happy here,” he says in Hansol’s language.

Hansol looks at him, looks surprised. “Why?”

“You are alone so often,” Minghao says, slow and careful. 

Hansol shakes his head. “I don’t mind it.”

Minghao hesitates, thinking for a moment, before he says, “I miss you.” He looks down at the table as he says it, feeling slightly embarrassed. It’s all so strange, this thing with Hansol, because — because it feels silly, to harbor childish feelings for someone he’s _married_ to. Silly on many levels, silly that he’s even feeling this way to begin with. 

But Hansol isn’t looking at him like it’s silly. “I miss you as well.” 

Minghao remembers that letter Hansol wrote him, months ago now, _I enjoy your company so_. He swallows, feeling distinctly nervous as he looks at Hansol.

“Tomorrow, you could join me,” Minghao says. It’s the most directly he can manage that sentiment in this language, though he’d like to say more. 

Hansol nods, smiling softly. “That would be nice.”

The rest of their meal is quiet, but Minghao has trouble keeping the smile off of his face.

 

It’s a busy day, but Hansol joins him on it without complaint. Hansol sits quietly next to Minghao during meetings, and Minghao writes down words Hansol might not know, all the strange vocabulary of bureaucracy that neither of them have had reason to use with each other, or to read in books. Hansol watches him and smiles, trying to hide it behind his hand as Minghao’s advisors speak. They walk together through the castle, back and forth through hallways tending to different bits of things that Minghao thinks may not matter all that much, before Minghao checks a nearby clock.

“Were you ever trained in combat?” Minghao asks, not sure if Hansol knows that word. 

Hansol looks at him blankly. “Did you ever learn to fight?” Minghao tries again. 

“Oh,” Hansol says. “No, I did not. My father never liked fighting,” he says with an amused look.

“Well,” Minghao says. “Would...you like to watch?”

And maybe he’s imagining it, but he think he sees pink stain the top of Hansol’s cheekbones.

Minghao has never planned to enter into military ranks, and it has never been required of him. But still, he has trained. He’s decent with a sword, prefers a bow and arrow if he’s going to use a weapon, but he likes hand-to-hand combat the best. He likes the way he’s been trained to use his body fluidly, to calculate moves precisely. He’s worked with the same masters since he was a child, and they know him well, train him well. He spars with them until his muscles feel tight, a little out of practice. 

Hansol sits off to the side, looking interested, and Minghao can’t help to feel him in the audience as he moves. It’s strange, to want to impress him, an urge he’s never particularly felt before. But he knows this kind of thing can look impressive, if executed well — he wonders if he’s executing it well.

“That’s enough, Minghao,” the older man in front of him says, sitting on the dirt, his breath heavy after Minghao knocked him down. 

Minghao bows. “Thank you.” He wipes his brow with the sleeve of his loose shirt, shakes his hair out of his eyes, and walks with tired legs over to where Hansol is sitting.

“I imagine that was boring,” Minghao says apologetically, feeling self-conscious now of the way he thought of Hansol’s attention on him. 

Hansol, though, looks strange. Like he’s avoiding Minghao’s eyes, his gaze focused below his jaw. Minghao glances down, wondering if his shirt is stained, and finds that the top button is undone. As he brings his fingers to button it, Hansol responds, “No, no, not boring. You’re very skilled.”

“I’ve practiced for many years.”

Hansol stands, just barely shorter than Minghao, and reaches a hand out. “Your hair is —” he starts, but he doesn’t finish it, just runs delicate fingers through it. 

Minghao, surprised, almost steps back. But luckily, he catches himself, lets himself stay still in this moment. “Thank you,” Minghao says. 

Hansol nods. 

They stand there for a beat too long, looking at each other, Hansol’s hand not quite back to his side yet. 

“Would you like to go on a walk?” Minghao asks, speaking without thinking. 

“You have time?” Hansol asks, surprised.

Minghao shrugs. “I can make time.” The truth is, he has another meeting with an advisor soon, and he would have liked to bathe before that, but he figures it can wait. That advisor has kept him waiting plenty of times before. And he likes the way Hansol looks at him with his pretty eyes, and he’d like it to keep happening. 

They walk through the grounds like they did those first months, when they could only exchange a few words between them, when Minghao found it novel to walk with a pretty boy. 

“The way we live is strange,” Minghao says. “Everyone here. Our lives are so strange.”

“Strange in what way?” Hansol asks. He really has gotten much better, more fluent than Minghao expected him to be. 

“We are married,” Minghao says, then pauses to laugh a little. 

“Is that the part that is strange?” Hansol asks, but he looks amused too.

“Maybe,” Minghao answers. But no, that’s not it, not really. It’s the energy between them, the exciting little thrill he gets sometimes with Hansol, so at odds with what this was ever supposed to be. “You said once you were not disappointed, to marry me. Is that still true?”

Hansol raises his eyebrows. “Of course.”

“Why is that?” Minghao asks. He’s getting closer to the heart of the thing, the pulse he hears during their quiet dinners, when they touch. 

Hansol is quiet for a moment, running fingers over the leaf of a fern. They wound up in the garden without Minghao meaning them to. “I have never been in love before, but I think I may fall in love with you.”

Minghao feels stuck in place. He blinks, eyes feeling suddenly much heavier. “What a thing to say,” he manages.

Hansol is smiling, looking a little pink, but calm. “You once told me you liked my honesty.”

Minghao nods, because of course he does. He finds it thrilling and endearing.

“I would like yours as well,” Hansol says.

“I do not intend to be dishonest,” Minghao says, eyebrows furrowing guiltily.

“No. You were raised to protect yourself,” Hansol answers back. “But I am not going to hurt you.”

Minghao thinks for a moment that Hansol cannot know if that’s true or not; Minghao thinks for a moment about all the love stories he’s read where someone ends up hurt. 

“At least, I will try very hard not to,” Hansol follows up with, voice quieter. He takes a step toward Minghao, looking hopeful at him.

“I think I may have already fallen in love with you,” Minghao admits softly. “Troublesome, isn’t it?”

Hansol’s smile grows, blooms like the flowers they’re surrounded by. “I do not see the trouble at all, Minghao.” He reaches out and grabs Minghao’s hand, fingers shorter and broader than Minghao’s own, his touch warm. “You should go clean yourself up. You look awfully messy.”

Minghao nods, is more than willing to let himself be pulled along.

 

He finds that his dreams pale in comparison to the way it feels to wake up beside Hansol, warm in morning light. He finds that love stories pale in comparison to the way it feels to look at Hansol, smiling widely when Minghao mispronounces something, still trying to learn how to speak his mind in Hansol’s language. He finds that he is able to hold love in his hands after all, palms cupped so as not to let it spill.

**Author's Note:**

> thanks for reading! i can be found @idlemoonlight on twitter and curiouscat.


End file.
